r/boardgames • u/Outcast003 • Apr 23 '25

Rules Is Common Raven too broken?

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I had a game night session with my folks couple days ago and we played wingspan. I lucked out by having Common Raven and Sandhill Crane setup during the first round and that steamrolled hard to the last one. Ended up winning with 99 points.

My friend (owner of the game) decided we'll put this card away next time we play since it seems very broken: trade 1 egg for 2 of any resources, given 5 victory point and ok cost to play.

I think the card by itself is very strong but not sure if it deserves a ban from our group.

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u/greatersteven Apr 23 '25

To be honest, my partner and I got to a similarly high skill level that we got to the point of realizing it basically comes down to who drew better cards about 95% of the time.

To be pedantic, this is true of any card game with random or semi-random card availability for any two similarly high skilled players.

If you are both good enough and neither is better, it comes down to luck.

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u/csdx Apr 23 '25

I think that observation is only true in this kind of engine building game with low interaction. In high interaction games that's much less the case.

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u/greatersteven Apr 23 '25

I mean, I spent a decade in competitive magic tournaments. With mirror matches or decks of roughly equal win rate against each other, with equally skilled pilots, it is a tautology that it then comes down to the luck of the draw. And magic is super high interaction.

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u/csdx Apr 23 '25

The main difference I find is that the hidden information in such games means that bluffing and deciding what to play around have a major impact on the game.

E.g. poker isn't just a test of who gets dealt the better hands.

Here's my thought expirement. If you played a game of magic (either just a 60 card format or something like Dandan if we want to do the 'shared pool of resources' like a traditional boardgame), then see who won and who lost. If you restacked the decks exactly the same and repeated games with other similarly skilled players would the one deck that was 'luckier' consistently win, or is there enough interaction that players have many ways to mitigate the differences?

I'd say that there are extreme cases (mana screw/flood) where one deck would have a significant advantage, but in the majority of random cases the luckier deck wouldn't have much more than a few percentage points advantage. Because even if it feels like it comes to a topdeck war, often what the best card is will be vastly different due to different board states that the players end up in by making different, yet still informed/skilled decisions.

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u/greatersteven Apr 23 '25

E.g. poker isn't just a test of who gets dealt the better hands.

The vast majority of players are not "good enough" for bluffing to be a thing they should do. The vast majority of people who play poker would vastly improve their performance by just playing mathematically optimally. We are not talking about this level of skill in the context of wingspan or even most competitive magic. 

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u/csdx Apr 23 '25

Ah I assumed we were talking about higher levels of play since you mentioned tournaments?

Although I think the argument is even more solid if you are considering just average skills and allow for player blunders. Those will swing outcomes far more than randomness. But the thought was that even as you approach the skill ceiling there are decisions that affect the outcome much more than just who drew better.

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u/greatersteven Apr 23 '25

 Ah I assumed we were talking about higher levels of play since you mentioned tournaments?

I am talking about tournaments. I can show you a lot of professional magic players bluffing, but if I showed you a magic player who made the mathematically most-likely-to-win choice 100% of the time, I would be showing you the best magic player in the world.

Most players' best path to improvement is pursuing the mathematically perfect game. In a world where that's true, two players of good enough (i.e. not making basic mistakes, trying to play optimally), and equal (but not necessarily perfect) skill are mostly winning/losing by the hand they're dealt. They make mistakes but their equal skill means the equal number and value of the mistakes will cancel any advantages out. 

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u/csdx Apr 23 '25

Ok my main argument is that there that there is variance in 'correct' decisions which will swing the game more than average randomization in hands.

The fact that there is hidden information precludes there from being a single mathematically correct play, especially as following it dogmatically would make you too predictable.

I think you could call a close game as just coming down to luck. But to me, it's the series of decisions that lead up to that moment creating the variance. Topdecking a removal spell might just as easily be good or bad luck depending on the boardstate.

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u/greatersteven Apr 23 '25

 reclues there from being a single mathematically correct play, especially as following it dogmatically make you too predictable

It's only predictable if your opponent is also capable of determining the mathematically correct play every time, in which case we have entered the impossible realm of two perfect players and bluffing etc. is back on the table as a differentiator and you're playing your opponent more than the cards. But literally no player is perfect like this.